This document:
http://www.sls.hawaii.edu/bley-vroman/thee.txt

Last revised: 18 11 mo. 2003

Plain Speech FAQ

(On this topic, there is certainly much research which I am 
unaware of. If anyone knows of relevant citations, please let 
me know. I'd especially like to know more about regional 
differences among Quakers and the relationship of plain 
speech to dialect differences in Britain.)

Robert Bley-Vroman
2131A Atherton Road
Kailua, HI 96822

vroman@hawaii.edu
http://www.sls.hawaii.edu/bley-vroman/

See also Alan Firth's summary of discussion on this topic
on linguist-l

http://www.quaker.org/thee-thou.html

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A. "Correct" Quaker plain speech.

"Correct" plain speech (at least in America) as it finally 
developed employs "thee" when addressing a single person and 
"you" when addressing more than one person. Nominative 
(subject) and accusative (object) forms are identical: "Thee 
often came to Meeting late"; "I saw thee last night"..  With 
a singular subject ("thee") one uses the third singular verb 
inflection: "Thee is; thee has; thee may; thee comes; thee 
does"). With a plural subject ("you") one uses the regular 
plural verb form ("you are; you have; you may; you come; you 
do"). This is not completely consistent as speakers have 
naturally become less "proficient" as the forms have begun to 
die out. Also, some Quakers now are less careful in 
distinguishing plural from singular, using "thee" even to 
more than one person. 

Some Quakers will use plain speech, especially "thee", when 
speaking to other Quakers but will use ordinary English when 
speaking to non-Quakers. Plain speech is most likely now to 
be used in formalized Quaker contexts--the same situations 
where "Friend" as a form of address is most common, and, 
occasionally, one sees plain speech used in Quaker Internet 
newsgroups. In these contexts, plain speech, like the 
prominent use of "Friend" or other typical Quaker phraseology 
("This Friend speaks my mind"; "Way will open", etc.), calls 
attention to the essentially Quaker character of the 
discourse in which it is used. It reminds everyone "We are 
Quakers here." This function is quite different from what one 
finds in the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries.

==========================================================

B. The origin and development of the current system.

1. "Standard English" in the seventeenth century, as seen, for 
example in the King James Bible and the Book of Common 
Prayer.

In the second person, a distinction was made between the 
singular and the plural and between the nominative 
("subjective") case and the accusative ("objective") case, as 
follows:

       sg.         pl.
nom    thou        ye
acc    thee        you

[The genitive ("possessive") forms are "thy/thine" and 
"your".]

For example: 
"I will follow thee [acc.sg.] whithersoever thou [nom. sg.] 
goest."
"Give to him that asketh thee [acc. sg.], and from him that 
would borrow of thee [acc. sg.] turn thou [nom. sg.] away.

"Ye [nom. pl.] are the light of the world."
"But whom say ye [nom. pl.] that I am?"
"Behold I send you [acc. pl.] forth as lambs among wolves."
"Verily, verily, I say unto you [acc. pl.]..."

In the Book of Common Prayer, the priest addresses the 
congregation as "ye/you", and the congregation addresses the 
priest as "thou/thee". (The priest: "The Lord be with you."; 
The people: "And with thy spirit.")

With a "thou" subject, the verb has a special ending. 
Normally this is -(e)st (thou goest; thou hast; thou takest). 
However, with certain verbs, it is -t (thou art; thou shalt; 
thou wilt). These endings are not present in imperatives--
"turn thou not away"--or subjunctives--"if thou bring thy 
gift to the altar...".

I give this as "standard English". There was certainly variation, 
both regionally and by social group. By the time of the early 
Quakers, the distinction between thou/thee and ye/you based 
on plurality had begun to break down, eventually resulting in 
the present situation, where there is no distinction at all 
in second person forms, "you" being invariant.

---
2. Plural as a politeness form. 
In English, as in many languages, an association developed 
between plurality and deference, so that, for example, in the 
seventeenth century, it had come to be considered polite to 
use a plural form (ye/you) when speaking to a single person, 
especially a person of higher rank. Among the upper classes 
especially, ye/you was also used among equals as a sign of 
respect. The plays of Shakespeare are full of examples of 
social differentiations in pronoun use. Contemporary 
seventeenth-century commentators record that "thou" was used 
for equals or inferiors, whereas "you" was used for 
addressing superiors. Cheyney (1676; cited in Bauman 1983) 
writes: "We maintain that 'thou' from superiors to inferiors 
is proper, as a sign of command; from equals to equals is 
passable as a note of familiarity; but from inferiors to 
superiors, if proceeding from ignorance, hath a smack of 
clownishness; if from affectation, a tone of contempt."  (A 
"clown" in this sense is an ignorant peasant, a country 
bumkin.) 

Nearly all European languages share this association of 
plurality and deference.

---
3. Regional and social differences. 
It appears that the loss of literal plurality as a basis for 
the choice of pronoun and the rise of the "you of politeness" 
began in the south of England. Probably, at the time of early 
Quakerism, the regional language of many Quakers (typically 
from the north) would have been likely to have retained the 
older distinction. Also, one may assume that the association 
of "ye/you" with politeness was especially fashionable in the 
highly stratified society of the city and of the court and of 
the upper levels in the church and university hierarchies.  
It was among these upper and educated classes that one would 
be most likely to hear "ye/you" used of a single individual.

---
4. Attitudes of early Quakers. 
Early Quakers, Fox in particular, objected strongly to the 
use of "ye/you" when addressing a single individual. 
Not only does this usage showed deference based on rank, but 
it is inaccurate (hence untruthful). Saying 
"you" to a single individual would be like claiming you had 
many apples when in fact you only had one. Fox, John Stubbs, 
and Benjamin Furly published in 1660 a book on this matter 
which strikes the modern-day linguist as bizarre ("The 
Battle-Door for Teachers and Learners to Learn Singular and 
Plural"), in which they repeat over and over, with many 
examples from many languages and from the Bible, that there 
is a distinction between singular and plural, and that people 
ought to obey it. The authors observe with outrage that a 
person who correctly does obey it (a Quaker, for example, or 
perhaps a northerner) is called "clownish", "unmannerly", 
"ill-bred"; "a novice", "an idiot", and "a fool". Quakers'
insistence on using "thou", even when talking to a 
superior, must have given offense like that of their refusal 
to respect the "hat honor" or to use titles. Fox mentions 
that when he used "thou" and "thee" to a person of rank, it 
was "a fearful cut to proud flesh and self-honor." Fox also 
believed that the historical origin of the plural of 
politeness was the "royal we" as used by the Pope; and this 
association was additional reason to avoid it.

---
5. Later developments. 
Of course, the distinction of "thou/thee" and "ye/you", 
whether based on plurality or politeness has now essentially 
died out. By the nineteenth century, it was virtually extinct 
for most varieties of English. But Quakers still retained the 
older forms. At this point, the use of "thou/thee" by 
Quakers, with non-Quakers and Quakers alike, functioned 
essentially as a Quaker peculiarity--part of the "hedge"; it 
functioned sociolinguistically neither as a particular 
insistence on accurate ("truthful") speech nor as a refusal 
to use honorific language. 

---
6. Loss of the thou/thee distinction in Quaker speech.
(Here, I am on unsure ground. I know of no really good 
research on this matter, so what follows is mostly 
speculative.) As the singular/plural or familiar/polite 
distinction died out in most of English, a change within the 
Quaker usage began to take hold. The accusative "thee" form 
began to supplant the nominative "thou". This change is said 
to have been most complete in America. Interestingly, the 
change is parallel to the development in general English 
usage, where the accusative "you" eventually supplanted the 
nominative "ye". The thou/thee merger may also be related to 
regional dialects in England; those areas in which Quakerism 
was strong may have been losing the distinction, so that what 
was in part a regional peculiarity developed into a 
disinctive Quaker form of speech.

---
7. Change of the inflection on the verb to third singular.
As it finally evolved, much Quaker plain speech began to use 
the third person singular verb forms with "thee". So, instead 
of "thou art", "thou hast", we find "thee is", "thee has"
I know of no research on this phenomenon. This, too, is said 
to be a peculiarly American phenomenon. (Is it, and is there 
some regional basis in Britain here, too?)

=========

Robert Bley-Vroman
Honolulu Friends Meeting

====
A interesting discussion of Quaker views on language is that 
in:

Bauman, Richard. 1983. Let your words be few: Symbolism of 
speaking and silence among seventeenth-century Quakers. 
Cambridge University Press. 

Bauman has relatively little to say about the "thou/you" 
issue, emphasizing the larger context of the use of language 
in Quakerism. Especially interesting is the form of messages 
in early Quaker meetings ("incantory style", "heavily 
repetitive, rhythmic quality") and what Baumann calls the 
"rhetoric of impoliteness" in interpersonal interaction.

BTW. George Fox was also interested in teaching reading. See his 
"Instructions for Right Spelling", 1673.